


this will as strong

by asterismal (asterisms)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Alternate Universe - Labyrinth Fusion, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-29
Updated: 2019-12-29
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:08:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22020826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asterisms/pseuds/asterismal
Summary: It is not a corridor he finds, but a labyrinth.
Relationships: Harry Potter & Voldemort, Harry Potter/Voldemort
Comments: 8
Kudos: 184
Collections: Flashing into the New Year





	this will as strong

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Wolf_of_Lilacs](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wolf_of_Lilacs/gifts).
  * In response to a prompt by [Wolf_of_Lilacs](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wolf_of_Lilacs/pseuds/Wolf_of_Lilacs) in the [flashing_into_the_new_year](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/flashing_into_the_new_year) collection. 



> **Prompt:**
> 
> _Labyrinth_ -inspired, canon divergent Harrymort! Can it be done? I think it can.
> 
> \- Instead of the Department of Mysteries corridor in Harry's dreams during fifth year, it's a maze.  
> or  
> Harry—vanquisher of Voldemort, auror, single father—inadvertently wishes one of his children away and has to run a labyrinth to retrieve them. Voldemort, by some quirk of having all the bits of his soul strewn across limbo, etc., etc., is the labyrinth's overseer.  
> or  
> If you can think of something else I haven't considered, then go for it. :kawaiiharry:  
> (This would be okay as femslash, too.)
> 
> Here's my attempt at a canon-compliant labyrinth fusion. All of my labyrinth knowledge comes from reading fanfic, so be warned that it’s a very loose interpretation.

The ground beneath his feet is cold. 

Each step hurts, in a curious sort of way; he wonders if his toes might fall off. On either side of him, walls of black stone stretch so high they block out the sun. He trails one hand along the wall, as if afraid to lose his place, and he walks. 

He walks, and he doesn’t know where he’s going, and he thinks he doesn’t mind.

If he has been here before, he cannot remember. 

Every night, he dreams of walls, of walking down an empty path and finding no end at all. He doesn’t tell anyone. 

There are worse things to dream about.

(A _maze_ , he thinks at first. A _labyrinth_ , he learns later, and he laughs.)

Like most things do, the dream changes. 

Beneath his feet, the dirt path turns to stone, then to moss, then dirt again, and the passage grows narrower—grows wide enough to fit ten men walking side by side. Turns in the path come quicker now; there are still no branches to be found. 

And then one night, another pair of footsteps joins his own. An echo, he tells himself, only— “Harry Potter,” Voldemort says to him, “You’re not supposed to be here.”

And so Harry runs. At Voldemort’s command the walls become like hands, and at his feet, the path crumbles. 

And Harry wakes, but still he is not where he belongs. 

Arthur Weasley stumbles to the floor, gasping for breath with one hand pressed to his profusely bleeding neck, and Harry Potter put him there.

He is to learn Occlumency, and Snape is to teach him.

It’s a disaster from the beginning.

It’s worse by the end; by some fluke of magic, Snape presses just hard enough, in just the right place, that they stumble through the walls together. Unlike any time Harry has been here before, the labyrinth is _alive_ beneath his feet. It knows they’re here.

The walls ripple, spitting black tar that coats the path.

A sound like a thousand snakes hissing fills the air, and the stones at their feet begin to crack. 

He turns to Snape, and he stills. His professor’s face is white with something like fear; his eyes are wild. 

“Where are we?” Snape demands. He lashes out one hand, as if to strike Harry, or perhaps to grab him, but it’s no use. Like a ghost, his hand passes right through. “Potter, what _is_ this?”

“I don’t know,” Harry says, frantic. The snakes are calling a warning now, and he doesn’t know who it’s for, but he intends to heed it. “But Voldemort—”

With a groan, the walls buckle, and Harry makes a futile attempt to grab onto Snape, to pull him along, before he runs. Snape cannot touch him. Perhaps this means he cannot be touched by the labyrinth. Perhaps he’s safe.

But Harry isn’t, and he knows it _._

He is real to this place in all the ways that Snape is not. And yet, it has never acted this way before (he has never brought someone with him before). He doesn’t want to think about what this means. 

He runs, and there is no end in sight, no safety. 

He runs until he can’t run any longer. He stumbles, and he thinks he hears Snape shouting, or maybe it’s only a dream. All around him, the walls crumble into dust, and the last thing he sees is a dark cloud rolling over him—and the last thing he hears is a familiar voice, calling his name.

Snape will not enter his mind again. 

When Harry asks why, he gets a jar thrown at his head for his efforts. He doesn’t ask again.

And so he keeps dreaming. Sometimes, Voldemort finds him. 

“Where are we, anyway?” Harry asks him once, having learned by now that Voldemort can bend this place into any shape he wills, and so there is no use in fighting. 

Voldemort smiles and asks, “Where do you think?”

And the walls press closer

One night, Voldemort attempts to trap him.

Instead of walls, Harry opens his eyes to find he is surrounded by mirrors. “What is this?” he asks, and Voldemort appears behind him. 

“You have evaded me for too long, Harry,” Voldemort says, as if this is any sort of explanation. “I grow tired of it.”

Harry lashes out, but Voldemort only disappears. “You can’t keep me here,” Harry warns.

The next time Voldemort speaks, his voice comes from behind him. Harry turns, but Voldemort isn’t there. In his reflection, the man is behind him, looking back at him with a gleam of triumph in his eyes.

“Many have vowed to escape Lord Voldemort,” he says. He bends closer, leans down, until he can press his face alongside Harry’s. He bares his teeth in a grin, his red eyes narrowed. “And many have failed. You will be no different.” 

“You’re wrong.” He must be. 

“I would love to stay and debate with you, only, I have an investigation to complete.” In the mirror, he watches as Voldemort’s hand creeps over his chest. The other lands in his hair and pulls, and he gasps as his neck is bared. He can see Voldemort’s hands on him, and he can feel the way they move him, but he doesn’t _feel_ _him_. “Now be good, Harry Potter, and _stay.”_

Harry thrashes in his hold, but it’s difficult to fight an enemy who isn’t there. “Let me go!”

“You have no power here, Harry Potter,” Voldemort tells him, gleeful. He sways closer, until Harry thinks he can almost feel the heat of him, the weight of his body pressing down. “There is no escape.”

With one last smile, he touches his mouth to Harry’s cheek, and this time Harry feels it. And then he is gone.

And it is true, Harry thinks, panting, that Voldemort has the power to shape this place, to turn stone into glass and sweep the ground from beneath his feet, until he doesn’t know up from down. 

But Harry is real to this place, and that too has a certain power. 

He’s always been good at breaking things. 

He lashes out, not at any reflection but at the mirror itself. His fist cracks against the glass, and he shouts at the pain of it. With a gasping breath, he steels himself to do it again. With one hit, the glass shudders. With another, his skin breaks and smears his reflection in red. 

He doesn’t stop. 

He beats his fists against the glass and finally, _finally,_ it breaks. 

The next one falls easier.

“What are you doing?” Voldemort is back now, and he sounds as afraid as he is angry, but Harry doesn’t answer. He thinks it should be obvious. 

His hands are almost numb, now, but he can’t stop. Not now. Not yet. He turns to the next mirror, and he breaks this one too. As he watches the pieces shatter to the ground, he finds some satisfaction in the way Voldemort’s reflection breaks apart. 

“You foolish boy. Do you have any idea—?” Harry raises his fists again, and Voldemort snarls. 

Before he can break the final mirror, Voldemort appears. For real this time. 

He catches Harry’s fists in his hands, jerks his arms behind his back, and Harry _screams_. He thrashes in the man’s hold, kicks his bare feet at the mirror as Voldemort lifts him from the ground. Voldemort attempts to grip him tighter, to pull him back and away, but Harry’s hands and arms are slippery, coated in blood, cut to ribbons by broken glass, and Voldemort cannot hold him forever. 

He breaks free.

The last mirror shatters beneath his fist and in the back of his mind, Voldemort screams with him.

When he wakes, his hands are wet. For a long moment, Harry only lies there in the dark, staring up at the canopy above his bed until the scent of iron is enough to make him sick. 

Then, he gets out of bed. 

He goes to wash his hands in the bathroom sink, and it is as if the blood was never there at all.


End file.
